My jaw hit the floor when I saw this ad. Car companies have been one of the most blatant culprits to the destruction of the Earth’s environment since the Industrial Revolution. Because of their links with fuel companies (like Shell, who, by the way, made a record profit of 27.6 billion dollars in 2007) , they have purposely delayed the release of all non-fossil energies, in spite of their myriad advances. All this sanctimonious Toyota Prius stuff seems pathetic when you know that electricity and even water alone can be used to power modified engines efficiently, and without any of the rancid emissions that accompany Shell’s product – but companies like Shell won’t allow that to happen.
But for a car company to suggest that their vehicle has something to do with saving African wildlife?? Multinationals like Suzuki have been raping third-world countries, Africa included, non-stop for a good century now. The history of human rights abuses committed by unscrupulous companies is long and gruesome.
Even to give a recent example: Countries like the Sudan cannot afford to harvest their own oil reserves, and so are farming it out to Chinese and US companies who have exhausted their other resources. These companies will gladly purchase fuel from corrupt governments, while at the same time turn a blind eye to genocide and ethnic cleansing in these same countries.
But, no, forget all that. We’re saving the world now. We’re protecting rhinos. Yes, that’s why Irish people buy SUV’s. To tear across the Serengeti with Tony Fitzjohn, looking for nasty poachers. It’s not the Soccer Moms with one lonely child in the back, driving around streets in Cork that are about half the size of the vehicle itself. It’s not the emasculated fathers whose brainless rationale is usually, “Well, I want to keep my family as safe as possible” (and let’s not forget the unspoken addendum to this delightful morality; “And if I crash into some lower-class family driving a lesser car, to Hell with them. I’ve got bullbars, for Christ’s sake.”) No, it’s none of those. We’re saving rhinos, people.
How dare anyone compare owning a gas-guzzling, street-hogging, brat-freighting, tailgating SUV to saving the lives of endangered species in Third-World countries. It’s an insult to your intellience and mine. And doe-eyed Soccer Moms nothwithstanding, I’m hopeful that at least some Irish people are informed enough to be angry about this – and to tell Suzuki to cop on to themselves.
Has anyone seen the new Specsavers advert “featuring” Edith Piaf?
In it, she sings probably her most famous song, “Non, Je Ne Regrette Rien”. The subtitles show an incorrect translation of the French lyrics, saying that her only regret is not having bought glasses at Specsavers.
This is a song about and performed by a chronic alcoholic and drug user looking back on her life, and saying that she regrets nothing; that all the pain was worth it for her to become the person she now is. It is poignant and heartfelt.
Specsaver’s hijacking of the song and the woman to offload a couple of pairs of glasses is, in my opinion, beyond reprehensible. Aside from the fact that it takes the personal, emotional core of the song and castrates it for the sake of corporate “humour”, did any of the firm’s copywriters do any research on the woman whatsoever? If they had, they would have known that from the ages of three to seven, Piaf was blind as a result of the disease Keratitis. That’s right, Specsavers have tastefully chosen to parody a dead alcoholic who had no sight as a child.
How could this ad have been passed as suitable for broadcast? How could noone have objected to it? Using a dead person to sell a product is tantamount to graverobbery. It’s just as classy as Benetton’s ad featuring a young man dying of AIDS.
I think that controversy is a wonderful thing. But in the hands of advertisers, it is always suspect. There is always the ulterior motive, the hidden agenda. Everything they show you is designed to get you to do something. To not only buy a product, but to buy into a lifestyle (as Naomi Klein brilliantly argued in “No Logo”). Slogans like “Drink Coke” are not suggestions; they are orders, screamed at you from every poster and billboard, every television, every radio.
I feel embarrassed if I am watching a movie or programme with someone and the ads come on. It’s like a group of corporate idiots have marched into the room and started barking commands at you and yours. I find ads depressing in general; when the local companies have Christmas “all wrapped up” (brilliant) and multinationals are using Edith Piaf, there is little creativity in the divide.
I’m not getting my anarchist on; far from it. I know that advertising is a necessary evil. Much brilliant creative work is funded by it. But when it’s so evil it can reanimate the corpses of our dearly departed, it must be stopped.
It brings to mind Bill Hicks’ famous words about advertisers :
Shaun O Connor 